Rebalancing Civ4: RtR Mod

[luddite]

Anyone who starts to fall behind and/or becomes unable to keep up with the pack in a game does. For instance, pretty much everyone else in this game lamented the inability to trade once I started running away with it. Admittedly that was an unusual case, but not that unusual. I managed to secure a few extra cities early through a carefully planned war and careful diplomacy, and things started snowballing from there.

The thing is, in a game that's built (for better or worse) around the snowballing principle, tech trading is about the only leveller to allow smaller civs to have a chance against goliath civs. Of course, it can make the snowball worse if a couple of big civs happen to get together, but at least it does give the little guys more of a chance in some games (even if it does completely mess up the beaker vs hammer count once mass trading begins).

The problem I have with that is that civ is such long, long game. It can take a whole year to finish one game! Adding more mechanisms to let people in last place catch up just drags out the game even longer. I'd much prefer playing a faster game, so that we could finish and start a new one. Besides, there's plenty of ways to screw over an early leader even without tech trading.

Also, like Cull said, I don't want the diplomacy aspect of the game to be so powerful that the actual civ playing is irrelevant.

Here's my suggestion for tech trading- what making it so that it's actually a trade? That is, you lose knowledge of whatever tech you're giving the other person, and have to research it again. If you suddenly realize that you need a military tech you could convince someone to give it to you, or profit by giving up techs that you no longer need (like literature after building the epics) but you wouldn't be able to get a long-term research bonus by tech trading in this way.

[Lord Parkin]

So then civ games become huge diplomacy fests, less about MM, less about pure technical skill, more of who is the best negotiator, the most liked individual. If thats the game civ should be, sure I guess tech trading should be in every game. But civ is less of a game like Diplomacy to me, and probably closer to Starcraft(not that low level SC takes a lot of MM or macro skill, but still...)

The problem with that is that almost every game where you're interacting with humans requires negotiating to some degree. Even without tech trading on in multiplayer Civ, you'd still better not ignore the diplomacy side of the game, because those who take advantage of diplomacy will still form military alliances and (often) profit from doing so.

The simple fact is that you can't really separate the diplomacy entirely from Civ in multiplayer games (slow-paced pitboss and PBEM ones at least), and that's the way I think it should be. You shouldn't be able to play multiplayer like single player, after all - it shouldn't be like a solo game which only requires interaction with +/- numbers. There are real people playing around you, and like it or not you will (most of the time) profit more from bargaining and negotiating with them than not doing so. Tech trading is a huge part of that, and to me it makes the diplomacy side of the game that much more fun.

Simply put, I don't think you should be able to isolate raw civ skill from diplomatic cunning in a multiplayer game like you can in single player (or blitz multiplayer). You need a good helping of both to do well in a (slow pitboss or PBEM) multiplayer game of Civ, and I don't think that's unfair. Just because some players happen to be more skilled negotiators than others doesn't mean that negotiation should be banned (or nerfed) so that the "raw civ skill" players can do better. Indeed, I'd argue it makes for more interesting games that way.

Well, that was a rather long-winded way of saying "I disagree", but then I'm not exactly known for lack of verbosity I guess.

[RefSteel]

Along the lines of "research pacts" and Lord Parkin's "Teach, not Trade" ... what if tech trades did not provide the recipient with a "free" tech, but provided a research bonus toward the tech in question? Thus, you'd still have to research the tech yourself, but could do so at a much lower cost if someone has offered you their expert knowledge.

I'm not sure what bonus would be best, but also unsure of what the real impact would be on an MP game; just brainstorming....

[Cyneheard]

Well, if we want to do that, why not just make the others-known-bonus larger? Like 100%? Ask PBEM2 how that's gone, tbh.

[Lord Parkin]

The problem I have with that is that civ is such long, long game. It can take a whole year to finish one game! Adding more mechanisms to let people in last place catch up just drags out the game even longer. I'd much prefer playing a faster game, so that we could finish and start a new one. Besides, there's plenty of ways to screw over an early leader even without tech trading.

Well, I guess that's a difference of mindset. I'd rather play one game very carefully all the way to the end (win or loss) than just blitz through each game to the point where I thought the winner was clear and start a new one. It's tempting to just say "oh well, player X will probably win from here, let's start afresh" when you hit the point where it looks hopeless, but I often find it rewarding to keep playing on regardless.

Also, like Cull said, I don't want the diplomacy aspect of the game to be so powerful that the actual civ playing is irrelevant.

To add to my post above, I would say that I don't believe any amount of diplomatic skill can compensate for a complete lack of civ skill. The best negotiator in the world isn't going to win if he has no clue how to play the game competitively. It's not the case for the reverse though: a certain threshold of civ skill can certainly compensate for a lack of diplomatic skill.

So basically, civ skill still trumps diplomatic skill in all cases. But diplomatic skill can sometimes make things turn out a little more differently than expected, which allows for a bit more variety and unpredictability in games. Anyway, that's my opinion at least.

Here's my suggestion for tech trading- what making it so that it's actually a trade? That is, you lose knowledge of whatever tech you're giving the other person, and have to research it again. If you suddenly realize that you need a military tech you could convince someone to give it to you, or profit by giving up techs that you no longer need (like literature after building the epics) but you wouldn't be able to get a long-term research bonus by tech trading in this way.

Interesting. The thing is, it doesn't make much logical sense (why is my entire civ's mind wiped when I teach someone else how to do something I've learnt?), and I doubt whether it would be much fun to play. Could be interesting for a variant, though.

Actually, I just had an idea... I'll chuck it in a separate post later though. Need to sort it out in my head first.

[Lord Parkin]

Along the lines of "research pacts" and Lord Parkin's "Teach, not Trade" ... what if tech trades did not provide the recipient with a "free" tech, but provided a research bonus toward the tech in question? Thus, you'd still have to research the tech yourself, but could do so at a much lower cost if someone has offered you their expert knowledge.

I'm not sure what bonus would be best, but also unsure of what the real impact would be on an MP game; just brainstorming....

Sounds similar to an idea I proposed for improving research pacts in Civ5, actually (back when I actually played it). That was more for aligning current tech focus though, not teaching past techs.

[Shoot the Moon]

The problem with that is that almost every game where you're interacting with humans requires negotiating to some degree. Even without tech trading on in multiplayer Civ, you'd still better not ignore the diplomacy side of the game, because those who take advantage of diplomacy will still form military alliances and (often) profit from doing so.

The simple fact is that you can't really separate the diplomacy entirely from Civ in multiplayer games (slow-paced pitboss and PBEM ones at least), and that's the way I think it should be. You shouldn't be able to play multiplayer like single player, after all - it shouldn't be like a solo game which only requires interaction with +/- numbers. There are real people playing around you, and like it or not you will (most of the time) profit more from bargaining and negotiating with them than not doing so. Tech trading is a huge part of that, and to me it makes the diplomacy side of the game that much more fun.

Simply put, I don't think you should be able to isolate raw civ skill from diplomatic cunning in a multiplayer game like you can in single player (or blitz multiplayer). You need a good helping of both to do well in a (slow pitboss or PBEM) multiplayer game of Civ, and I don't think that's unfair. Just because some players happen to be more skilled negotiators than others doesn't mean that negotiation should be banned (or nerfed) so that the "raw civ skill" players can do better. Indeed, I'd argue it makes for more interesting games that way.

Well, that was a rather long-winded way of saying "I disagree", but then I'm not exactly known for lack of verbosity I guess.

I think the question isn't whether diplomacy should play a part (it clearly will unless you are playing a CTON variant) but how much it should play a part and what the balance between diplomacy and raw civ skill is. In PB 3 here, for example, I think the balance went sharply too far toward diplomacy; raw civ skill had only minimal impact on the outcome of the game simply because no matter how great of civ skill on has, if they get left out or cut out of an alliance their game is as good as over.

Also worth noting from PB3 is that having unlimited tech trading there rather threw the balance of civ out of wack; the tech pace was so ridiculously fast that offensive wars were nearly impossible against the other alliance, as before you could even build an army of the current age the other alliance would have researched the next important military tech. The balance of civ between beaker requirements and hammer costs simply isn't meant to work with alliances of that many human players.

[Lord Parkin]

Okay, so here's the idea that I've just come up with. (Probably just as useless as my others, but hey, I'll give it a shot. )

Still along the "tech teaching" lines, what if you suffer a research penalty while teaching another civ a tech (or being taught a tech)? It makes at least some intuitive sense: some of your researchers have to spend time telling some of their researchers how to do the thing you're teaching. Thus, these researchers aren't available for conducting research along other lines while they're occupied there.

How would it work? Let's say for example that there's a 10% beaker penalty for teaching or being taught a tech, and you're both initially making 100 beakers per turn (no expenses for simplicity). For the 10 turns (or whatever number) while you're "teaching" the tech, both of your research rates go down to 90 beakers per turn. If you sign on to teach (or be taught) another tech, your rate goes down to 80 beakers per turn for 10 turns. If you sign on to teach (or be taught) a total of 10 techs at once, then sorry buddy, your personal research rate just went down to nil for the next 10 turns.

Actually, thinking about it, this might be a bit too open to exploit (just put research slider to zero while you're trading). Maybe it'd have to be an absolute beaker cost then... scaling across the game, of course. For instance, -10 beakers per turn early on while trading away (or recieving) a tech, -100 beakers per turn further on in the game, maybe around -1000 beakers per turn by the end of the game. Would require a lot of work and effort to work out the right numbers, though. Also, what would happen if someone somehow ended up with a negative beaker count (e.g. losing cities after signing multiple trade deals)?

Hmm, what about tying it to maintenance, instead? Say that maintenance costs scale up temporarily (or permanently??) the more techs you teach/are taught, indirectly forcing you to lower the science slider until (potentially) you can't research at all (for 10 turns, at least). Maybe that would work? I don't see any immediate loopholes, anyway.

Sorry for the slightly rambling post, but maybe there's the seed of an idea in there somewhere. Or maybe not.

[Lord Parkin]

I think the question isn't whether diplomacy should play a part (it clearly will unless you are playing a CTON variant) but how much it should play a part and what the balance between diplomacy and raw civ skill is. In PB 3 here, for example, I think the balance went sharply too far toward diplomacy; raw civ skill had only minimal impact on the outcome of the game simply because no matter how great of civ skill on has, if they get left out or cut out of an alliance their game is as good as over.

Also worth noting from PB3 is that having unlimited tech trading there rather threw the balance of civ out of wack; the tech pace was so ridiculously fast that offensive wars were nearly impossible against the other alliance, as before you could even build an army of the current age the other alliance would have researched the next important military tech. The balance of civ between beaker requirements and hammer costs simply isn't meant to work with alliances of that many human players.

Yeah, I've experienced this same problem before (although perhaps not quite to the same extent). The only time when you get a relief break is right at the end of the game, when there are no more techs to research and everyone can finally build armies that won't go obsolete a few turns down the road. Of course, by then it's usually a bit too late.

I still don't think that tech trading is inherently a bad idea. I just think that it absolutely wasn't implemented with large-scale, slow pitboss and PBEM games in mind. Tech trading can be immense fun with 3-6 players (or even more sometimes, depending on the map). It gets out of control with 12-18 or more players though, especially on a pangaea map. I still think (hope!) there might be some kind of fix we can implement, to keep tech trading in the game but to make the cost of it high enough that it's not the only viable option in large-scale games. (Or at least to make the benefits taper off and not be worth it for tech alliances bigger than 2-3 players.)

[fluffyflyingpig]

If eliminating large scale tech trading alliances is the goal, why not just turn on no tech brokering and make it so each civ can only trade any given tech once or twice? Sure trading still is the best choice, but now the alliances are smaller.